welcome

About Elissa Field

This is the website for the fiction and nonfiction writing of Elissa Field. If you arrived here from a social media site, you might check listings at the bottom of this post for links you may be looking for.

Of all things I write, I am most likely to put off updating my bio. The simple version is that I am a freelance writer and editor, currently dividing time between Connecticut and South Florida. I spent the last 4 years teaching writing and history at a fabulous private school to middle grade kids who were endlessly entertaining, and am mother to two mad scientists (ages 10 & 13) who only rarely blow up the lab. In the past, I had a longstanding gig with the state courts, where I served alternately as assistant to several judges and as a staff writer. Cool job, one of my favorites.

While my nonfiction writing has occasionally interrupted fiction for big chunks of time, fiction is my biggest passion — the secret super hero identity lurking behind all other writing I do. On this site, you’ll find a summary of short stories including link to one available online. On a separate page are summaries of novel projects. I had been balancing time between research for Wake or writing short stories, but all short stories went on hold as revisions to the novel draft took over last year. The novel has gone into advanced revisions and I’ve shared several stages of the revision process here on the blog — everything from clarifying character motivation to marking up a printed text. While teaching interrupts more concentrated work during the school year, the draft should be ready to query agents in coming months. Heavily character driven, my work tends toward literary, but my fascination with mystery and international affairs, and my experience in law, journalism, and history, tendsto add genre-bending aspects of mystery to my work.

This site houses my blog on writing and books. You are encouraged to join in comments beneath the posts, as readers are often part of my dynamic social media community, including members of online writing communities, bloggers and twitter-folk. I host a second blog, focusing on the teaching profession atMrs. T’s Middle Grades. Use badges and tabs in the sidebar to find more about my social media community.

Need a writer or editor for hire? I still take freelance clients for small projects during the teaching season and full time in summers. I have high standards, dynamic experience and am honest and straight-talking to work with. The Writer for Hire tab lists a complete menu of services I’ve offered over the years. Currently, the most common requests are for quick edits of short stories, novel chapters or blog posts. If you are interested in learning more about social media or platform building, feel free to send me a line, as my own social media practices allow me to triple readership each year.

What about bio basics? I’m originally from Michigan, lived briefly in Atlanta and North Carolina, then in the DC area and Richmond, Virginia, before moving to Florida. Each of those places (and my parents’ 230-yr-old home outside of NYC) have impacted my writing — from my farming grandparents and life on lakes in Michigan, to the year I was taught by an old Reverand who’d marched with Martin Luther King in Charlotte, to hours spent in stables in all of those places, to the southern influence of college in Richmond, to living in the tropics. I can’t mention where I’ve lived without mentioning traveling, since place and culture and languages fascinate me, as do international affairs. Degree-wise, I hold a bachelors in English and Writing from Virginia Commonwealth University, a certificate to teach English and History, and am a Masters candidate through the University of Florida.

Not perfect, but for the moment that will have to be good enough, because I’m tired of the old bio that was up here and am taking it down. As the editors at PaperDarts said on their submissions guidelines, I can do that, because I’m the boss lady.

I enjoy reading comments and am glad you stopped in, so do feel free to contact me through twitter, facebook, pinterest , Google+ or… or… I’m sure there’s more. The Facebook page is just for writing, so don’t think we have to be BFF’s for you to “friend” me.